Thank the RNG gods for another UA-camr that talks about obscure Japan (PC) only games in English! =) This history reminds me of the Sierra's (Ken and Roberta Williams) story as well. Unknown today, but very influential on its time.
I've never heard of your channel before, but when a half-hour long video about Soft Studio Wing showed up in my recommended feed, I HAD to check it out, as I'm an MSX collector with a handful of these titles in my possession (White & Black 1 and 2, and Hadou no Hyouteki) -- still as of yet unplayed, but even just popping them in for a quick demo play to test the cassettes/disks, I could tell that these titles were really something special. I wasn't sure what to expect from a channel I knew nothing about covering such an obscure topic as this, but DAMN if I wasn't captivated by this from beginning to end -- you really did your research, and Wing is a way more interesting company than I ever would've thought. Thank you for making this video, and introducing this unique company to the English-speaking world! I'm even more psyched to collect other Wing releases than I already was, and I think I might just take the time to pop the ones I already own in and give them a thorough playthrough.
Thank you for watching, it's good to give companies like this in the interest of providing a more complete history Re: collection, the rarest are definitely the Takeda Planning days. Those took forever to find, and I suspect as per the other comments there may be even more stuff out there, including a demo of a 3D version of Mirrors and most frustratingly a demo of Onryo Senki 2, which sounds like it was leaning towards a traditional 3D survival horror. Also Galactic Warrior Daimos is believed to be lost media so those are sort of.. the holy grails of that.
@@f_t_b2238 I definitely know the frustration -- collecting for MSX, you very quickly learn that there are some games that are basically white whales, and they're never the ones you might initially expect. Hopefully, these games and demos will surface one day -- I know I'll at least be keeping an eye out for them in my travels, and if I see them, I'll do my best to "rescue" them for sure. Interestingly, the first MSX game I ever "rescued" (as in, purchased, confirmed had never been archived on the internet, then successfully dumped for archiving) was a later rerelease of Hadou no Hyouteki that advertised it no longer required the use of a kanji ROM or kanji-compatible system -- a seemingly minor change that unexpectedly brought with it some visual changes and rewrites as well, as there are noticeable differences in the intro text and in screen transition effects between the original release and the no-kanji-ROM rerelease (sadly, with the original release being the more complete-seeming one, presumably because some disk space had to be sacrificed in the no-kanji-ROM version in order to make room for the additional kanji characters in the game font, resulting in some minor cuts). It's no Onryo Senki 2 or Mirrors demo, but hey, it's something, I guess? ;)
Interesting. I wonder if the endings were changed slightly. Hadou no Hyouteki runs *incredibly* fast given the visual tricks it was pulling. It's also one of the few puzzly ones - it's beyond the scope of the video but the Vietnam section was tricky, so there may even be some modifications beyond text rewording. That's an excellent find.
@@f_t_b2238 Incidentally, you've gotten yourself a new subscriber, as I just looked at your previous uploads and wound up adding all four of them to my watch later list. ;) Daiva and Ashguine don't have the best track record for me as a gamer, TBH, as I've found the games I've played in both series to be overly demanding and thus more frustrating than fun to play, but I nonetheless have always been fascinated by Ashguine trading hands to different developers for each of its entries, and Daiva for telling a singular story stretched across multiple systems, and am very fascinated to learn more about how such things came to be. Game Arts, then, is certainly of interest to me, as one of my favorite games on MSX is Fire Hawk, hands down -- Fire Hawk is a bloody masterpiece, to such an extent that I feel it could be released on Steam today with virtually no changes and still be highly reviewed as an indie darling. It was SO ahead of its time in so many ways, from having an optional tutorial built in, to having a female protagonist going off to rescue her male love interest, to the subtle interconnectedness of the stages, to the surprisingly deep and well-written story, to the sense of progression and atmosphere enhanced by the placement of downed pilots as NPCs/hints. Absolutely remarkable stuff, and though it's cool it got an English release through Sierra, I hate that Sierra removed the intro and changed the backstory to make the main character more brash and impulsive (and give her a miniskirt, of course!). And early survival horror is of interest to me because I'm quite certain you must talk about War of the Dead, which is another favorite in my MSX collection -- the first one more than the second, actually, despite its clunkiness, as I really love the atmosphere it creates through the day/night cycle and the overwrought, melodramatic story peppered with horror movie references (not to mention that droning and incessant yet oddly moody soundtrack!). So yeah... Your topic choices for these videos are impeccable, and if your other videos are anywhere near as informative as this one, I'm going to really enjoy watching them all. I've been meaning to maybe start a UA-cam series of my own reviewing some of the more obscure or interesting things I've encountered through my collecting (I really want to introduce the English-speaking world to the bizarre and weirdly fascinating wild west that is the Takeru disk-writer scene, for example), and the more channels I encounter like yours and Basement Brothers, the more inspired I'll likely be to get off my lazy butt and make it happen. ;)
Shiryou Sansen I was covered by others here - ua-cam.com/video/QH1fbDNq1H4/v-deo.html - so my work on it currently stands as part of an unfinished larger video about horror titles that this spun out of, along with titles like D', the Horror House games, and Produce. That'll show up at some point once I can find a good thoroughline for it and an appropriate way to censor and discuss some titles. In retrospect I could have gone into Fire Hawk in greater detail, as that video is one of the shorter ones, mostly talking about Thexder, Silpheed, and contemporaries . I agree that Fire Hawk is excellent. The Daiva one is more a story about the creator and writer and an attempt to explain what the heck the story was lol. The honest answer about "why this and not that" is ..... sometimes other folks get to it first. Geimu's excellent video about RiverHillSoft comes to mind. I definitely look forward to hearing more about the things you've got cooking there, as it's always good to have more information out there.
I always figured World of Horror must have been inspired by something specific from the era it's replicating. Looks like the youtube algorithm can still send something worthwhile my way if I just avoid clicking on all the bait. Thanks for shedding a light on a gaming scene I otherwise never would have known about or where to look.
I'm not sure if World of Horror was specifically inspired, as mentioned elsewhere there's some Hypercard influence there, but that's a good question for the developer. Makai Revenge is the closest aesthetically but Legend of White and Black and Onryo Senki share some plot elements and feel similar thematically. Glad you enjoyed the video, it was an interesting bunch of folks.
Your channel is just beyond fantastic! As a long time MSX user and fan of Japanese computer gaming, I am just in awe that your channel exists and the quality of the videos you produce. Just fantastic! 👏🏻
A really good overview of a rather obscure subject. Seeing what lesser known studios were capable of and the people and ambitions behind their games is an interesting topic. Good choice on listing the sources as well.
Thanks for hipping everyone to Soft Studio Wing. I just wanted to say thanks for the wonderful video. The context you provide and the well curated research is appreciated. I really liked hearing your perspective.
Your cadence, pace and voice, did you narration and voice over work for educational television and/or documentary work? I mean, it's awesome and oddly nostalgic.
@@f_t_b2238 I'm honestly surprised you didn't do it professionally. You honestly sound like someone who's done the voice over work for NHK documentaries that was brought over to the States in the 90s, or even History Channel work pre-"aliens" era, when it was actually good. I love it and I sorely miss reading like yours. It's not just comforting, it's calming and really puts me into a learning mood.
Totally right. For a moment when the video started I wondered if this was a recording of something that aired on TV, which would have been odd for such a niche topic. Love the style, keep it up.
Excellent channel and really glad I found it! I'll say that you've got a unique voice for a gaming channel, for lack of a better way to put it, you sound like a 90s history channel narrator and that really made you stand out for me. Wishing your channel the best of luck!
Such an interesting and unexplored topic, great obscure b-roll, and all around great narration in content and execution. I hope you keep making this videos.
They aren't the only company to have done it, but from what I've seen it's the most extensive usage of this concept. Also the music is great so that helps as well, you can see how a lot of the staff already being active or former musicians really shaped the games.
It's so frustrating that in America during the 80s video games were for kids but in Asia they were for adults and they got to enjoy truly mature titles.
Certainly true on the console side of things but I do think the early PC market has a good amount of titles for adults like a lot of Infocom games. That being said I don't think any of this stuff would have made it over here at time of release due to the Satanic Panic.
To be fair, there were many adult PC games in the West too, just in different genres than VNs/adventure games usually. This genre just isn't that popular in the West, besides some of the biggest titles; even less so back then. Even in countries where PC gaming is more popular than console gaming (pretty much all of Eastern Europe for instance) this is not a big genre comparatively.
The Mirrors translation is thankfully quite good, with the only downside being the speed of the game is affected a bit, so thankfully not a situation similar to Kamitaichi no Yoru becoming Banshee's Last Cry or such :)
Nah, just still working on the next video. Personal matters are slowing me up, and the video is big with a lot of captures. Rate should be about every 1 or 2 months or so moving forward.
I recently stumbled upon your channel and today I watched all the videos. I just want to say that I love them, I have a huge interest in old games, systems and of course games never released in the west. Amazing work, dude!! I learned some really interesting things by watching these videos.
Thank you so much for putting this all together, listening to this I kept thinking of elements of games I've played that I now realise were probably influenced by the works of Studio Wing. I'm going to track down a copy of Onryou Senki, it sounds fun! and spooky! Thank you again for the video,
This comes up in the comments a lot, so I fired off an email to the studio asking this exact question. I'll post if I get a response. For the most part I don't think they are directly related - WING tend to be more about tension and suggestion and WoH feels more blatantly Junji Ito (I just can't imagine something like Tomie in a WING game), but Hadou no Hyouteki is the closest tonally, being the goriest, so that would be my bet on a possible inspiration, particularly the "manga panel" display.
Interesting company. I played through Mirror's english patch months ago and wanted to talk about it myself but never found the time to finish the script. Destruction is one game that I'm really interested in due to its sick as hell visual effects, transitions, and music. Also do you have the audio to those cassettes from "Shiro to Kuro no Densetsu"? That music is really good! Anyways, can't wait for what the next video could be.
The biggest collection I found of the soundtracks was through EGG, which are here and are remastered (to the best of their ability, it's old tapes). I don't see the Windows version of Hyakki on there, but that one might have to be extracted from the Flash file. Those would be higher quality than my "stumble through the game and record the music" rips lol www.amusement-center.com/project/emusic/index.cgi?mode=search&page=1&sssort=desc&artist_id=105 Masaharu's remixes are here as well, but nothing from Destruction on there. onkyo.st-wing.net/
Of course! More eyes on this stuff are good, and there's a lot I had to cut out for pacing reasons. The WING fansite mentioned has a very large interview with some of the staff, as well as some more stuff about their marketing. There is also some info on cancelled games they never released, including one based on UFO abductions and a simulator about running a cult. The Takeda Planning / 2000s revival era stuff usually has to be wayback machine'd, for whatever reason that era was the most difficult to pull stuff from.
Great video! Dont buy a new microphone! I love the ultra compressed sound. 😂 I wonder if this studio was an influence on panstaz, creator of World of Horror?
That's a good question that I'm honestly not sure of the answer - World of Horror looks a bit more like Mac Hypercard to me, but Onryo Senki and especially Makai Revenge have a similar vibe going on at points.
Surprisingly, there are two artists with similar names - Haruhiko Souno is the artist featured here, and is a musician and occasional psychic. Haruhiko Shono (of Gadget etc) is a different person, and that tripped me up in a previous draft. There will actually be a video on Shono later once I can find enough footage to make it unique as I also find his art projects interesting. Sorry about that - regional accent slipped through there a little...
That's the music from the cassette tape that came along with Legend of White and Black Vol. I. You would play the tape when instructed on a separate stereo during key game moments.
Yup, Uri Geller came up in other comments. The MSX article seems to imply they could all do that, but Sono is the one that seems to have known the most about occult topics. I didn't talk so much about the weird supernatural stuff when making Onryo Senki - I have to obey UA-cam's content regulations - but that's covered in an interview in one of the links at the credits :) I'll post the link in a sec
did you record your own footage for Legend Of White And Black? this might be a lot to ask, but would an upload of the full playthrough be possible? thank you!
All footage is recorded and captured unless otherwise noted. I believe a playthtough of LoW&B exists on UA-cam already and will link it if I can find it again, otherwise knee deep in writing, editing and capturing for the the next video. Did you have a specific volume in mind?
For example, here's Vol. 1: Hyakki. I do my own captures (i dont want to step on the work of others)but these are highly useful for walkthroughs as the text ones sometimes miss a parser or two... ua-cam.com/video/gZr1vQMCkp0/v-deo.html
It's convoluted but Project EGG does offer a couple of these for surprisingly cheap. It's just you have to register in one region for buying in another region and deal with their loader @_@ This would be a nice thing for a Steam port,or a phone, or the Switch, but given how Portopia was handled recently that might be very wishful thinking on my part.
Yup lol - according to one of the sources I pulled for research, they simply did this because they liked the bands and actors they likeness'd. Given the crazy number of musicians on the staff, it actually does a pretty good portrayal of the more mundane bits of musician life too, which gives the game a nice atmosphere. One thing I could not obtain was an advertised trailer for a 3D Polygon version of Mirrors with the band similarity removed (it was to be on that demo disk in the video), but I like it better with the likenesses in it, it firmly grounds the story in a very specific time.
19:05 So was "The King of the North" a reference to the Book of Daniel, where that's the prophesized bad guy who becomes kind of a template for later Christian conceptions of the Antichrist? Or just a coincidence? It'd be easier to guess for Shin Megami Tensei, which loves sprinkling in random religious references even when they're nonsensical, but harder to tell here.
Nah I think it's just an oblique reference to the Lawn Chair King from the Enjoy the Silence video. Everything in that game is an 80s music Easter egg in one way or another. Not much Christian mythology in Studio WING games, honestly.
Honestly the history of this studio is only a few feet to the left of being the plot of a Shin Megami Tensei game EDIT: Oh, that explains why their stories are also SMT adjacent lmao
Definitely part of the spiritualism craze of the mid 1980s which had the Nishitani books as part of it, but surprisingly in WING's titles technology is more of a benefit than the Lovecraftian AI of the Digital Devil Story novels. The Legend of White and Black's protagonists use all sorts of devices, and computer databases play a big part in Onryo Senki. Some of the puzzles in relation to that in LoW&B are real headaches lol I didn't see any cite for this but I wouldn't be too surprised if John Carpenter's Prince of Darkness was an influence, the vibe is really similar.
@@f_t_b2238 So I just looked up Prince of Darkness, and cannot believe I have never heard of it despite loving The Thing. Definitely going to check it out soon, it sounds like 80's techno-religion pulp at it's finest!
@StrykerMagnum it's not as good as The Thing but it's got some absolutely outstanding sequences. Also recommend it for the cast which is a fun mix of prior Carpenter actors.
That's a hard question to narrow down. If we're talking historical importance then from the hip I'd say Dragon Slayer, Mystery House, Metal Gear, Silpheed, JB Harold Murder Club, Daisenryaku, Nobunaga's Ambition, Portopia Serial Murder Case, Ozma Wars, and Ys. From a more personal perspective, in terms of what ive enjoyed the most so far I'd say Metal Gear 2, Shiryou Sansen: War of the Dead 2, Onryo Senki, 38 Kilo no Koku, SD Snatcher, Super Laydock, Zeilard, Thexder, Popful Mail, and Broadway Elena (I like rhythm games).
Yeah, it's kind of a sarcastic parody of the case, but once real poisoned candy started showing up, they had to adjust it because it came off as cruel, basically. Audiences still found it in bad taste, tho, even with the changes. Basically it started development when it was just a weird kidnapping, but it was about to release when it became a moral panic. So they tweaked it a bit, but folks were still kinda "eh" about it. But without that mishap we wouldn't have the games in the rest of the video, so they recovered pretty well
Uri Gellar's thing definitely feels like something very much of its time, but that was something associated with extrasensory powers for a while, until a joke in The Matrix killed it stone dead lol. Definitely a "had to be alive at the time moment".
Yeah the similarities are pretty amusing. I know there's rights issues about the likenesses but I hope at some point permission is granted to use them, the only really really "this is the same guy" character is Andy Fletcher. One thing I suspect exists but found no footage of is a redo of Mirrors without the likenesses, but that feels like it would lose charm a little...
Interesting. That would be news to Masaharu's blog (which mentions it as somerthing he wished he had) as well as every single enthusiast site I checked, including WING's fan club itself. which were my verification sources on that. Even game databases classify it as lost, and there's certainly no image on TOSEC, redump, etc. Even japanese comps for pc88. Even wing's fan club figured it for regional sale only. I'm not gonna rule out errors but you might have lucked out there :)
Just to be clear this is the software I mean. It does not appear to be a licensed product of Tosho Warrior Daimos lol www.generation-msx.nl/software/soft-studio-wing/galaxy-soldier-daimose/release/1749/
Definitely agree there. For whatever reason, the pc engine cd version works with auto translators in retroarch quite well, it's just the pc engine version, which isn't quite so atmospheric.
I mean, if I said the full name every time it would be a much longer video :p As far as the seagull logo, there were a couple different variations over the years. I didn't go into too terribly much detail but the fansite listed in the credits has a collection of every single logo used . I'll post the link to the direct page in a second.
stwing.web.fc2.com/enigma/logo/logo.html here you go. It's usually a bird of some kind but I think the "SSW" one was going to be for driving games, something they never really got started with aside from Constructor's Grand Prix.
@@f_t_b2238 Heheh, I just love that corny intro with the voice and the jingle. :P Thanks for the link. It's surprising how many different logos they used (logo 3 being my personal favorite). Kinda reminds me of the way how Sein Soft/Zain Soft/Xain Soft would keep changing the spelling of their company name over the years.
DAMN man this is great, so glad I found this channel. Thank you! Really takes me into the world of these developers, the superhuman gods who communicate with the higher gods beyond our realm.
Thanks for another informative video on an obscure (to westerners at least) Japanese developer. Some of their adventure games look quite interesting, hopefully more fan translations to english will be done for them in the future.
You are most welcome. It's not as good as the home computer version, but Ztranslate through Retroarch works quite well with Onryo Senki's console port. It's still awkward, but it's playable. Of the games covered in the video, Makyu Den and the racing game didn't need too much Japanese. On the other side of things, Morico Threat wasn't very playable due to it wanting kana input. Mirrors would probably have done ok over here if the license was resolved or the portraits were reworked, it's very "mid90s supernatural adventure game" about five years early lol
Thanks for creating and posting this video. I stumbled upon your channel, and I'm currently loving your content. I quite enjoy your decision to use the various games scores as background music for this video. Do you know if it is possible to purchase copies of the scores, or do you know if they have been backed up publicly somewhere?
Hello, Currently the soundtracks are sold here: www.amusement-center.com/project/emusic/index.cgi?maker_id=30 Music in the video is usually from the game being cited, with the exception of the biographic bits, which are things I remixed from various looperman samples.
awesome video. thanks for sharing this story. you have a nice voice that fits this type of content. I felt like I was watching a DVD behind the scenes or something!
You picked up an amazing maniac maker. I played with PC-88MA when I was a student. The sampling sound was good with an eerie atmosphere. Seven years later, it was remade on Windows 95 and played on CD sound sources. With 256-color image quality, the sound and BGM have been upgraded, and it was refreshing to switch to mouse play. I remembered those days fondly.
That's interesting- I had seen some compilation re-releases for NEC systems but I didn't know there were even more for the later ones in addition to the Sound Novel one covered in the video. That happens sometimes- I'll most likely do some followup at the end of the year as either items are found or I learn more things. I definitely think the Windows 95 sound novel version of Onryo Senki brings back the horror elements that I thought the PC Engine one went a little too bright on. Also agree about the mouse - the video I'm working on now has some mouse-supported Windows conversions and it helps a bit, especially with detective games.
Nah, spoon bending was popularized by a guy called Uri Geller, a popular illusionist / psychic in the 1970s/1980s , who is probably the primary inspiration for that. Because of Geller, spoon bending is usually referenced as a visual gag for psychic power.
Wow,I love everything about this. Japanese culture in the 80s, 80s music production, vintage computing, the occult, retro gaming, chip tunes.
元スタッフですが…先ほど視聴しましたが、当時の情報とかよく調べていて『WING愛』を感じる内容で感動しました！！ 素敵な動画、有難うございます♬
(私の日本語が変だったら許してください....翻訳ソフトを使っています。)
こちらこそ! WINGのコンピューターゲームは傑作だ。ビデオを見てくれてありがとう!
I just wanna say how underrated this channel is. Thanks for all your work.
Thank the RNG gods for another UA-camr that talks about obscure Japan (PC) only games in English! =)
This history reminds me of the Sierra's (Ken and Roberta Williams) story as well. Unknown today, but very influential on its time.
I've never heard of your channel before, but when a half-hour long video about Soft Studio Wing showed up in my recommended feed, I HAD to check it out, as I'm an MSX collector with a handful of these titles in my possession (White & Black 1 and 2, and Hadou no Hyouteki) -- still as of yet unplayed, but even just popping them in for a quick demo play to test the cassettes/disks, I could tell that these titles were really something special.
I wasn't sure what to expect from a channel I knew nothing about covering such an obscure topic as this, but DAMN if I wasn't captivated by this from beginning to end -- you really did your research, and Wing is a way more interesting company than I ever would've thought.
Thank you for making this video, and introducing this unique company to the English-speaking world! I'm even more psyched to collect other Wing releases than I already was, and I think I might just take the time to pop the ones I already own in and give them a thorough playthrough.
Thank you for watching, it's good to give companies like this in the interest of providing a more complete history
Re: collection, the rarest are definitely the Takeda Planning days. Those took forever to find, and I suspect as per the other comments there may be even more stuff out there, including a demo of a 3D version of Mirrors and most frustratingly a demo of Onryo Senki 2, which sounds like it was leaning towards a traditional 3D survival horror.
Also Galactic Warrior Daimos is believed to be lost media so those are sort of.. the holy grails of that.
@@f_t_b2238 I definitely know the frustration -- collecting for MSX, you very quickly learn that there are some games that are basically white whales, and they're never the ones you might initially expect. Hopefully, these games and demos will surface one day -- I know I'll at least be keeping an eye out for them in my travels, and if I see them, I'll do my best to "rescue" them for sure.
Interestingly, the first MSX game I ever "rescued" (as in, purchased, confirmed had never been archived on the internet, then successfully dumped for archiving) was a later rerelease of Hadou no Hyouteki that advertised it no longer required the use of a kanji ROM or kanji-compatible system -- a seemingly minor change that unexpectedly brought with it some visual changes and rewrites as well, as there are noticeable differences in the intro text and in screen transition effects between the original release and the no-kanji-ROM rerelease (sadly, with the original release being the more complete-seeming one, presumably because some disk space had to be sacrificed in the no-kanji-ROM version in order to make room for the additional kanji characters in the game font, resulting in some minor cuts).
It's no Onryo Senki 2 or Mirrors demo, but hey, it's something, I guess? ;)
Interesting. I wonder if the endings were changed slightly. Hadou no Hyouteki runs *incredibly* fast given the visual tricks it was pulling. It's also one of the few puzzly ones - it's beyond the scope of the video but the Vietnam section was tricky, so there may even be some modifications beyond text rewording.
That's an excellent find.
@@f_t_b2238 Incidentally, you've gotten yourself a new subscriber, as I just looked at your previous uploads and wound up adding all four of them to my watch later list. ;) Daiva and Ashguine don't have the best track record for me as a gamer, TBH, as I've found the games I've played in both series to be overly demanding and thus more frustrating than fun to play, but I nonetheless have always been fascinated by Ashguine trading hands to different developers for each of its entries, and Daiva for telling a singular story stretched across multiple systems, and am very fascinated to learn more about how such things came to be.
Game Arts, then, is certainly of interest to me, as one of my favorite games on MSX is Fire Hawk, hands down -- Fire Hawk is a bloody masterpiece, to such an extent that I feel it could be released on Steam today with virtually no changes and still be highly reviewed as an indie darling. It was SO ahead of its time in so many ways, from having an optional tutorial built in, to having a female protagonist going off to rescue her male love interest, to the subtle interconnectedness of the stages, to the surprisingly deep and well-written story, to the sense of progression and atmosphere enhanced by the placement of downed pilots as NPCs/hints. Absolutely remarkable stuff, and though it's cool it got an English release through Sierra, I hate that Sierra removed the intro and changed the backstory to make the main character more brash and impulsive (and give her a miniskirt, of course!).
And early survival horror is of interest to me because I'm quite certain you must talk about War of the Dead, which is another favorite in my MSX collection -- the first one more than the second, actually, despite its clunkiness, as I really love the atmosphere it creates through the day/night cycle and the overwrought, melodramatic story peppered with horror movie references (not to mention that droning and incessant yet oddly moody soundtrack!).
So yeah... Your topic choices for these videos are impeccable, and if your other videos are anywhere near as informative as this one, I'm going to really enjoy watching them all. I've been meaning to maybe start a UA-cam series of my own reviewing some of the more obscure or interesting things I've encountered through my collecting (I really want to introduce the English-speaking world to the bizarre and weirdly fascinating wild west that is the Takeru disk-writer scene, for example), and the more channels I encounter like yours and Basement Brothers, the more inspired I'll likely be to get off my lazy butt and make it happen. ;)
Shiryou Sansen I was covered by others here -
ua-cam.com/video/QH1fbDNq1H4/v-deo.html - so my work on it currently stands as part of an unfinished larger video about horror titles that this spun out of, along with titles like D', the Horror House games, and Produce. That'll show up at some point once I can find a good thoroughline for it and an appropriate way to censor and discuss some titles.
In retrospect I could have gone into Fire Hawk in greater detail, as that video is one of the shorter ones, mostly talking about Thexder, Silpheed, and contemporaries . I agree that Fire Hawk is excellent.
The Daiva one is more a story about the creator and writer and an attempt to explain what the heck the story was lol.
The honest answer about "why this and not that" is ..... sometimes other folks get to it first. Geimu's excellent video about RiverHillSoft comes to mind.
I definitely look forward to hearing more about the things you've got cooking there, as it's always good to have more information out there.
I always figured World of Horror must have been inspired by something specific from the era it's replicating. Looks like the youtube algorithm can still send something worthwhile my way if I just avoid clicking on all the bait.
Thanks for shedding a light on a gaming scene I otherwise never would have known about or where to look.
I'm not sure if World of Horror was specifically inspired, as mentioned elsewhere there's some Hypercard influence there, but that's a good question for the developer. Makai Revenge is the closest aesthetically but Legend of White and Black and Onryo Senki share some plot elements and feel similar thematically.
Glad you enjoyed the video, it was an interesting bunch of folks.
Onryo Senki is fascinating. Thanks for documenting.
Your channel is just beyond fantastic! As a long time MSX user and fan of Japanese computer gaming, I am just in awe that your channel exists and the quality of the videos you produce. Just fantastic! 👏🏻
thanks! the next one should be coming soon - I got a concussion and it slowed it up a bit.
A really good overview of a rather obscure subject. Seeing what lesser known studios were capable of and the people and ambitions behind their games is an interesting topic. Good choice on listing the sources as well.
This is a great video, UA-cam algorithm is working fine for me!
Thanks for hipping everyone to Soft Studio Wing. I just wanted to say thanks for the wonderful video. The context you provide and the well curated research is appreciated. I really liked hearing your perspective.
Your cadence, pace and voice, did you narration and voice over work for educational television and/or documentary work? I mean, it's awesome and oddly nostalgic.
I have not narrated professionally, but have worked in educational media in various times of my life, good ear.
Wow, knowing this just makes everything more awesome.
@@f_t_b2238 I'm honestly surprised you didn't do it professionally. You honestly sound like someone who's done the voice over work for NHK documentaries that was brought over to the States in the 90s, or even History Channel work pre-"aliens" era, when it was actually good.
I love it and I sorely miss reading like yours. It's not just comforting, it's calming and really puts me into a learning mood.
Totally right. For a moment when the video started I wondered if this was a recording of something that aired on TV, which would have been odd for such a niche topic. Love the style, keep it up.
Excellent channel and really glad I found it! I'll say that you've got a unique voice for a gaming channel, for lack of a better way to put it, you sound like a 90s history channel narrator and that really made you stand out for me. Wishing your channel the best of luck!
Such an interesting and unexplored topic, great obscure b-roll, and all around great narration in content and execution. I hope you keep making this videos.
I have deeply fallen in love with your channel.
That cassette idea is really smart!!!
They aren't the only company to have done it, but from what I've seen it's the most extensive usage of this concept. Also the music is great so that helps as well, you can see how a lot of the staff already being active or former musicians really shaped the games.
This was an incredible video. Wonderful job, I really hope your channel gets big. You put a lot of care into this!
懐かしい貴重な動画をありがとうございます、子供の頃を思い出しました
気に入っていただけてうれしいです!
It's so frustrating that in America during the 80s video games were for kids but in Asia they were for adults and they got to enjoy truly mature titles.
Certainly true on the console side of things but I do think the early PC market has a good amount of titles for adults like a lot of Infocom games.
That being said I don't think any of this stuff would have made it over here at time of release due to the Satanic Panic.
Not really.
To be fair, there were many adult PC games in the West too, just in different genres than VNs/adventure games usually. This genre just isn't that popular in the West, besides some of the biggest titles; even less so back then. Even in countries where PC gaming is more popular than console gaming (pretty much all of Eastern Europe for instance) this is not a big genre comparatively.
the way you edit and narrate makes this really look like some weird dvd documentary.
really cool
amazing vid, deserves way more attention
What a NEAT little documentary! Subscribed :D
Fascinating video. Never had heard about them until now. Now I dread for fan translations as well.
The Mirrors translation is thankfully quite good, with the only downside being the speed of the game is affected a bit, so thankfully not a situation similar to Kamitaichi no Yoru becoming Banshee's Last Cry or such :)
great stuff, please keep this up! subscribed!
New viewer here. Really cool video. Really reminds me
of when I'm there.
Great video, just subscribed. 80s era Japanese PC game is endlessly fascinating to me but it’s hard to find information about it.
The job of gaming historian is never easy. ;)
This was interesting, great video retrospective.
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Love seeing underground game documentaries.
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Great work and what a great watch, thank you!
Very fascinating indeed.
I'm so glad I found this channel.
This is one of those times where YTB does god's work with recommendations. Amazing video.
I love this video. Thank you for bringing Studio Wing and their games to my attention. I can't wait to watch more from you.
great channel I hope you haven't abandoned us
Nah, just still working on the next video. Personal matters are slowing me up, and the video is big with a lot of captures. Rate should be about every 1 or 2 months or so moving forward.
This was a fascinating look into Wing and their history, thanks so much!
Enjoyed the video, didn’t know anything about any of this but enjoyed the look and presentation of the graphics of these games, thanks, nice deep dive
I recently stumbled upon your channel and today I watched all the videos. I just want to say that I love them, I have a huge interest in old games, systems and of course games never released in the west. Amazing work, dude!! I learned some really interesting things by watching these videos.
This is really incredible stuff, thank you for sharing and researching
The MSX has a fantastic game library, I highly recommend playing it sometime.
Subscribed instantly; you make the kind of videos I love to dive into. 👏🏾 Keep the uploads coming.
Great video! I never knew there was another electronic store turned game developer other than falcom
great video, really interesting and well researched :]
Thank you so much for putting this all together, listening to this I kept thinking of elements of games I've played that I now realise were probably influenced by the works of Studio Wing. I'm going to track down a copy of Onryou Senki, it sounds fun! and spooky! Thank you again for the video,
The indie game from 2019 World of Horror seems really inspired by Wing’s games.
This comes up in the comments a lot, so I fired off an email to the studio asking this exact question. I'll post if I get a response.
For the most part I don't think they are directly related - WING tend to be more about tension and suggestion and WoH feels more blatantly Junji Ito (I just can't imagine something like Tomie in a WING game), but Hadou no Hyouteki is the closest tonally, being the goriest, so that would be my bet on a possible inspiration, particularly the "manga panel" display.
Great stuff here really enjoyed watching this.
Great video. There's something so interesting about early japanese horror games.
Really interesting topic & not something I knew about. Thanks
Man, I love this kind of stuff. Please keep going.
Interesting company. I played through Mirror's english patch months ago and wanted to talk about it myself but never found the time to finish the script. Destruction is one game that I'm really interested in due to its sick as hell visual effects, transitions, and music. Also do you have the audio to those cassettes from "Shiro to Kuro no Densetsu"? That music is really good! Anyways, can't wait for what the next video could be.
The biggest collection I found of the soundtracks was through EGG, which are here and are remastered (to the best of their ability, it's old tapes). I don't see the Windows version of Hyakki on there, but that one might have to be extracted from the Flash file. Those would be higher quality than my "stumble through the game and record the music" rips lol
www.amusement-center.com/project/emusic/index.cgi?mode=search&page=1&sssort=desc&artist_id=105
Masaharu's remixes are here as well, but nothing from Destruction on there.
onkyo.st-wing.net/
@@f_t_b2238 ah I see. Sucks that you have to pay 330 yen for each and they aren’t even FLAC or WAV files.
Phenomenal video. Thank you.
Liked and subscribed!
Excellent, well structured content, decent narration. Bravo 👏
Fascinating , excellent video. thank you.
New subscriber, I love how the voice and what I assume Is a voice filter adds a retro vibe to make it feel like it was shot and recorded in the 80s.
Great video thanks, I really appreaciate the credits and links at the end, I like doing my own research with them.
Of course! More eyes on this stuff are good, and there's a lot I had to cut out for pacing reasons. The WING fansite mentioned has a very large interview with some of the staff, as well as some more stuff about their marketing. There is also some info on cancelled games they never released, including one based on UFO abductions and a simulator about running a cult.
The Takeda Planning / 2000s revival era stuff usually has to be wayback machine'd, for whatever reason that era was the most difficult to pull stuff from.
Great video! Dont buy a new microphone! I love the ultra compressed sound. 😂 I wonder if this studio was an influence on panstaz, creator of World of Horror?
That's a good question that I'm honestly not sure of the answer - World of Horror looks a bit more like Mac Hypercard to me, but Onryo Senki and especially Makai Revenge have a similar vibe going on at points.
Randomly found this amazing video
What a great video 🇯🇵💿
Very intersting
instant subscribe great video thanks for sharing this info!🙏
Wow, super great you made this, was really hyped to learn Haruhiko Shono was involved in these games too, as I'm a massive fan of his other work :)
Surprisingly, there are two artists with similar names - Haruhiko Souno is the artist featured here, and is a musician and occasional psychic.
Haruhiko Shono (of Gadget etc) is a different person, and that tripped me up in a previous draft. There will actually be a video on Shono later once I can find enough footage to make it unique as I also find his art projects interesting.
Sorry about that - regional accent slipped through there a little...
Cool channel
What is the music at 7:00? It sounds great. Also, great documentary!!
That's the music from the cassette tape that came along with Legend of White and Black Vol. I. You would play the tape when instructed on a separate stereo during key game moments.
@@f_t_b2238 - that's excellent. I really like that track that was playing. Fit the mood so well.
23:23 hearing this presenter say absolute fire made me chuckle 😅😊
I try to tone down the jokes but some slip in from time to time lol
怨霊戦記の音楽を作った方はユリ・ゲラーのようにスプーン曲げができたそうです。
それにしてもあなた、Maniacですね
Yup, Uri Geller came up in other comments. The MSX article seems to imply they could all do that, but Sono is the one that seems to have known the most about occult topics. I didn't talk so much about the weird supernatural stuff when making Onryo Senki - I have to obey UA-cam's content regulations - but that's covered in an interview in one of the links at the credits :) I'll post the link in a sec
Here you go, interview with Haruhiko Souno himself that was cut for time :)
stwing.web.fc2.com/enigma/interview/intv-souno.html
did you record your own footage for Legend Of White And Black? this might be a lot to ask, but would an upload of the full playthrough be possible? thank you!
All footage is recorded and captured unless otherwise noted. I believe a playthtough of LoW&B exists on UA-cam already and will link it if I can find it again, otherwise knee deep in writing, editing and capturing for the the next video.
Did you have a specific volume in mind?
For example, here's Vol. 1: Hyakki. I do my own captures (i dont want to step on the work of others)but these are highly useful for walkthroughs as the text ones sometimes miss a parser or two...
ua-cam.com/video/gZr1vQMCkp0/v-deo.html
i wanna play it
It's convoluted but Project EGG does offer a couple of these for surprisingly cheap. It's just you have to register in one region for buying in another region and deal with their loader @_@
This would be a nice thing for a Steam port,or a phone, or the Switch, but given how Portopia was handled recently that might be very wishful thinking on my part.
18:32 Lol I did not see that coming, yeah "What if?".😆
Yup lol - according to one of the sources I pulled for research, they simply did this because they liked the bands and actors they likeness'd. Given the crazy number of musicians on the staff, it actually does a pretty good portrayal of the more mundane bits of musician life too, which gives the game a nice atmosphere.
One thing I could not obtain was an advertised trailer for a 3D Polygon version of Mirrors with the band similarity removed (it was to be on that demo disk in the video), but I like it better with the likenesses in it, it firmly grounds the story in a very specific time.
19:05 So was "The King of the North" a reference to the Book of Daniel, where that's the prophesized bad guy who becomes kind of a template for later Christian conceptions of the Antichrist? Or just a coincidence? It'd be easier to guess for Shin Megami Tensei, which loves sprinkling in random religious references even when they're nonsensical, but harder to tell here.
Nah I think it's just an oblique reference to the Lawn Chair King from the Enjoy the Silence video. Everything in that game is an 80s music Easter egg in one way or another.
Not much Christian mythology in Studio WING games, honestly.
Like there's an actual castle, the protagonist goes there in his dreams
Honestly the history of this studio is only a few feet to the left of being the plot of a Shin Megami Tensei game
EDIT: Oh, that explains why their stories are also SMT adjacent lmao
Definitely part of the spiritualism craze of the mid 1980s which had the Nishitani books as part of it, but surprisingly in WING's titles technology is more of a benefit than the Lovecraftian AI of the Digital Devil Story novels. The Legend of White and Black's protagonists use all sorts of devices, and computer databases play a big part in Onryo Senki. Some of the puzzles in relation to that in LoW&B are real headaches lol
I didn't see any cite for this but I wouldn't be too surprised if John Carpenter's Prince of Darkness was an influence, the vibe is really similar.
@@f_t_b2238 So I just looked up Prince of Darkness, and cannot believe I have never heard of it despite loving The Thing. Definitely going to check it out soon, it sounds like 80's techno-religion pulp at it's finest!
@StrykerMagnum it's not as good as The Thing but it's got some absolutely outstanding sequences. Also recommend it for the cast which is a fun mix of prior Carpenter actors.
What would you say are the top 10 Japanese PC games of the 80s?
That's a hard question to narrow down. If we're talking historical importance then from the hip I'd say Dragon Slayer, Mystery House, Metal Gear, Silpheed, JB Harold Murder Club, Daisenryaku, Nobunaga's Ambition, Portopia Serial Murder Case, Ozma Wars, and Ys.
From a more personal perspective, in terms of what ive enjoyed the most so far I'd say Metal Gear 2, Shiryou Sansen: War of the Dead 2, Onryo Senki, 38 Kilo no Koku, SD Snatcher, Super Laydock, Zeilard, Thexder, Popful Mail, and Broadway Elena (I like rhythm games).
3:33 why did the game have controversy? It was based on the real life kidnapping ?
Yeah, it's kind of a sarcastic parody of the case, but once real poisoned candy started showing up, they had to adjust it because it came off as cruel, basically. Audiences still found it in bad taste, tho, even with the changes.
Basically it started development when it was just a weird kidnapping, but it was about to release when it became a moral panic. So they tweaked it a bit, but folks were still kinda "eh" about it.
But without that mishap we wouldn't have the games in the rest of the video, so they recovered pretty well
I used different sources but details on the real life case can be found here
ua-cam.com/video/09qAoR7RgMc/v-deo.html
6:19 bro I can bend spoons, hand me a spoon 🥄 and I can show you
Uri Gellar's thing definitely feels like something very much of its time, but that was something associated with extrasensory powers for a while, until a joke in The Matrix killed it stone dead lol. Definitely a "had to be alive at the time moment".
@@f_t_b2238 Oh I was just going to use my hands to bend it, but you remind me there is no spoon 🚫🥄
A Depeche Mode video game was not something I was expecting going into this video but im down
Yeah the similarities are pretty amusing. I know there's rights issues about the likenesses but I hope at some point permission is granted to use them, the only really really "this is the same guy" character is Andy Fletcher.
One thing I suspect exists but found no footage of is a redo of Mirrors without the likenesses, but that feels like it would lose charm a little...
Daimos isn’t lost media. I have a physical copy so it can’t be that rare.
Interesting. That would be news to Masaharu's blog (which mentions it as somerthing he wished he had) as well as every single enthusiast site I checked, including WING's fan club itself. which were my verification sources on that. Even game databases classify it as lost, and there's certainly no image on TOSEC, redump, etc. Even japanese comps for pc88. Even wing's fan club figured it for regional sale only.
I'm not gonna rule out errors but you might have lucked out there :)
Just to be clear this is the software I mean. It does not appear to be a licensed product of Tosho Warrior Daimos lol
www.generation-msx.nl/software/soft-studio-wing/galaxy-soldier-daimose/release/1749/
someone please translate the original onryo senki
Definitely agree there. For whatever reason, the pc engine cd version works with auto translators in retroarch quite well, it's just the pc engine version, which isn't quite so atmospheric.
BY WING ~~ BY WING ~~ by wing ~~ by wing ~~ utz utz tz tz tz tz ~~
I mean, if I said the full name every time it would be a much longer video :p
As far as the seagull logo, there were a couple different variations over the years. I didn't go into too terribly much detail but the fansite listed in the credits has a collection of every single logo used . I'll post the link to the direct page in a second.
stwing.web.fc2.com/enigma/logo/logo.html
here you go. It's usually a bird of some kind but I think the "SSW" one was going to be for driving games, something they never really got started with aside from Constructor's Grand Prix.
@@f_t_b2238 Heheh, I just love that corny intro with the voice and the jingle. :P Thanks for the link. It's surprising how many different logos they used (logo 3 being my personal favorite). Kinda reminds me of the way how Sein Soft/Zain Soft/Xain Soft would keep changing the spelling of their company name over the years.
日本人以外にソフトハウス・ウィングの動画が作られるとは・・・マニアックすぎて驚いた。怨霊戦記は私も好きです。
私のビデオを見てくれてありがとう！私の言葉遣いを許してください。
私がこのビデオを作ったのは、多くのビデオ エッセイが Sweet Home や BIOHAZARD のようなゲームだけを扱っているように感じたからです。 1980 年代から 1990 年代初頭にかけて開発された他の多くのゲームのいくつかに光を当てたいと思いました。
(Please excuse grammar, using translation software)
It's crazy that a studio can be so incredibly ahead of its time and still so criminally unknown.
"Being ahead of your time is just as bad as being behind it."
- Ridley Scott on Bladerunner
Sharp. Real sharp.
DAMN man this is great, so glad I found this channel. Thank you! Really takes me into the world of these developers, the superhuman gods who communicate with the higher gods beyond our realm.
The artwork on these games is also very interesting ❤
Thanks for another informative video on an obscure (to westerners at least) Japanese developer. Some of their adventure games look quite interesting, hopefully more fan translations to english will be done for them in the future.
You are most welcome.
It's not as good as the home computer version, but Ztranslate through Retroarch works quite well with Onryo Senki's console port. It's still awkward, but it's playable.
Of the games covered in the video, Makyu Den and the racing game didn't need too much Japanese. On the other side of things, Morico Threat wasn't very playable due to it wanting kana input.
Mirrors would probably have done ok over here if the license was resolved or the portraits were reworked, it's very "mid90s supernatural adventure game" about five years early lol
Another piece of gaming history to my collection and appreciation. Great work there, sir!
Thanks for creating and posting this video. I stumbled upon your channel, and I'm currently loving your content. I quite enjoy your decision to use the various games scores as background music for this video. Do you know if it is possible to purchase copies of the scores, or do you know if they have been backed up publicly somewhere?
Hello,
Currently the soundtracks are sold here:
www.amusement-center.com/project/emusic/index.cgi?maker_id=30
Music in the video is usually from the game being cited, with the exception of the biographic bits, which are things I remixed from various looperman samples.
This was quite interesting, you got a new subscriber, gonna check mirrors as it looks like something to put my hands on
This is interesting. Knew nothing about these guys. Thank you for uploading.
Thanks! Similar stuff will be coming in the future! I don't have things down to an exact science yet but usually it's one every 30-60 days or so.
Great video about a game I never heard about. I was interested from start to end.
thankyou for talking about these games! been curious for a while
Great upload! Thank you!
awesome video. thanks for sharing this story.
you have a nice voice that fits this type of content. I felt like I was watching a DVD behind the scenes or something!
+1 sub
You picked up an amazing maniac maker.
I played with PC-88MA when I was a student.
The sampling sound was good with an eerie atmosphere.
Seven years later, it was remade on Windows 95 and played on CD sound sources.
With 256-color image quality, the sound and BGM have been upgraded, and it was refreshing to switch to mouse play.
I remembered those days fondly.
That's interesting- I had seen some compilation re-releases for NEC systems but I didn't know there were even more for the later ones in addition to the Sound Novel one covered in the video. That happens sometimes- I'll most likely do some followup at the end of the year as either items are found or I learn more things.
I definitely think the Windows 95 sound novel version of Onryo Senki brings back the horror elements that I thought the PC Engine one went a little too bright on. Also agree about the mouse - the video I'm working on now has some mouse-supported Windows conversions and it helps a bit, especially with detective games.
I don't know how I stumbled on this, but I am fascinated by your work.
Subbed
This was really interesting to watch! Thanks for making this.
Music in Onryo Senki is incredible, haunting and anxiety inducing. But the game itself is very hard to play unless one has high level of patience.
You might like the Windows port better, as that's more or less a straight up visual novel version.
Loving these docus, your presentation style is excellent, ty and please make more :)
That's the plan :)
Great documentary. Perfectly done!
Did the spoon bending inspire the Pokémon kadabra?
Nah, spoon bending was popularized by a guy called Uri Geller, a popular illusionist / psychic in the 1970s/1980s , who is probably the primary inspiration for that. Because of Geller, spoon bending is usually referenced as a visual gag for psychic power.
0:27 i think the game its mirrors and the soundtrack is amazing
Yes, Mirrors is covered later in the video.
Great video and channel